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The Colorado Buffaloes started a perfect 3-0 in Deion Sanders’ debut season before coming crashing back to reality in Game 4. The Oregon Ducks manhandled the visiting Buffs to the tune of a 42-6 shellacking.
A new report suggests that Coach Prime and Co. believed there was foul play involved in that contest. The Ducks weren’t playing by the rules!
Colorado entered the matchup with boatloads of hype, but they’d soon be humbled in the unfriendly confines of Autzen Stadium. A raucous crowd helped fuel the Oregon team as it jumped out to a quick 35-0 first-half lead.
From there, they were in cruise control.
Tempers flared in that meeting from beginning to end. At one point, an angry Buffaloes player was seen snatching a bandana from an Oregon fan’s head while exiting to the locker room.
Before kickoff, Colorado players stomped on the Ducks’ midfield logo in the ultimate sign of disrespect.
When the clocks hit 0:00, it was Dan Lanning’ bunch who was laughing.
“The Cinderella story is over, man. They’re fighting for clicks; we’re fighting for wins. There’s a difference.”
-Dan Lanning on Oregon’s win over Colorado
After the game, a bit of controversy was sparked due to comments made by former NFL wide receiver Keyshawn Johnson. He insinuated while on Undisputed that “jealous” coaches teamed up to provide the Ducks with a gameplan for Colorado.
He suggested that rivals passed out information to help Oregon beat Deion Sanders. While those claims were never proven, it does seem the Buffs believed some sort of espionage was taking place!
Colorado cried to the PAC 12 after the loss.
Front Office Sports revealed that the school reached out to the league with a belief that Oregon had taken part in infiltrating their game film database.
Colorado football staffers identified multiple potential incursions into the team’s online service that stores practice video and other data, a source with direct knowledge of the matter told Front Office Sports.
Sanders was involved in the initial outreach to the Pac-12, in which Colorado alleged Oregon played a role in the unauthorized access…
Catapult, an industry-leading video replay system used by Colorado, conducted its own review of allegations of improper access last fall, and its investigation found “the security of [Catapult’s] systems was not compromised,” the company told FOS.
Ultimately Colorado backed off and didn’t provide the Pac-12 with evidence that Oregon or any other entity or person was involved in the alleged incursion, the two sources said.
They believed there was a reason for the on-field dominance. Oregon knew what coming!
It doesn’t seem there was much to back the claims as the school never provided any evidence of a data breach.
This game would end up being the start of a late season slide for the Buffaloes, who finished the year 1-8 over their last nine contests.
Oregon, meanwhile, would go 11-1 in the regular season before falling in the PAC 12 Championship game to national runner-up Washington.
Both teams have since moved on from the conference with the Ducks joining the Big 10 and Colorado heading back to the Big XII.